Sacco pushes Avs to be tougher team

ST. PAUL, MINN. -- One of coach Joe Sacco's stated goals for this new, truncated Avalanche season is to be "harder to play against." To which the standard reply from any coach is: "Doesn't everybody?"

No team wants to be known for being easy to play against. So it remains something of a nebulous phrase one game into the Avs' 48-game season, which started Saturday night with a 4-2 loss to the Minnesota Wild at the Xcel Energy Center.

But Sacco clearly wants the Avs to be physically tougher to play against. He wants them to hit harder, to be quicker on the puck defensively and, if need be, drop the gloves with no hesitation. That helps explain why 6-foot-6 enforcer Patrick Bordeleau was in the Avs' lineup for the opener -- and the former minor-league journeyman played well, notching an assist in the first game of his NHL career.

Minnesota found Colorado's fourth line of Bordeleau, Mark Olver and Cody McLeod tough to play against. McLeod scored a goal and got in a fight, finishing an assist short of a Gordie Howe hat trick. Sacco will take that tough, gritty, respectable play at both ends every game.

Unfortunately, the flip side of irascibility -- the occasional foolish penalty -- helped beat the Avs on Saturday. Winger Steve Downie served six minutes of penalties in a disastrous second period, four of those after cross-checking violations. Downie has always taken the random undisciplined penalty, so it will be up to Sacco to better define to him and every other player just what "hard to play against" really means.

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"It means playing the game hard and playing the right way," Sacco said when asked to be more specific about his mantra.

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